Jan(ko) of Czarnków ( pl, Jan(ko) z Czarnkowa) (ca. 1320–1387), of Nałęcz coat of arms, was a Polish chronicler, Deputy Chancellor of the Crown and Archdeacon of

Gniezno Gniezno (; german: Gnesen; la, Gnesna) is a city in central-western Poland, about east of Poznań. Its population in 2021 was 66,769, making it the sixth-largest city in the Greater Poland Voivodeship. One of the Piast dynasty's chief cities, ...

. He started his career as a diplomat in service of one of Polish bishops and later joined the Royal Chancellery. From 1366 to 1371 he was the Deputy Chancellor. After the death of

Casimir III the Great Casimir III the Great ( pl, Kazimierz III Wielki; 30 April 1310 – 5 November 1370) reigned as the King of Poland from 1333 to 1370. He also later became King of Ruthenia in 1340, and fought to retain the title in the Galicia-Volhynia Wars. He ...

in 1370, Janko supported Casimir IV of Pomerania against Louis I of Hungary. Losing the struggle with

Angevin Angevin or House of Anjou may refer to: *County of Anjou or Duchy of Anjou, a historical county, and later Duchy, in France **Angevin (language), the traditional langue d'oïl spoken in Anjou **Counts and Dukes of Anjou * House of Ingelger, a Frank ...

dynasty supporters, he was exiled in 1371, but returned in 1375. In the years 1377-1386 he wrote a chronicle about the years 1370–1384 and events he witnessed. Some historians consider him the author of the Chronicle of Greater Poland. The chronicle, now devoid of beginning and end, covers the period between 1370 and 1384. It has the characteristics of both a diary and an anti-Angevin political pamphlet.J. Szlachtowski Monumenta Poloniae Historica, vol. 2, 1872, (Polish translation: J. Żerbiłło titled The Chronicle of Janek from Czarnków, Warsaw 1905), manuscripts (9 copies) from the 14th and 15th centuries in libraries in: Krakow, Rome, Wrocław, Wilanów and Królewiec.

References

1320 births 1387 deaths Polish chroniclers 14th-century historians Canons of Gniezno 14th-century Polish nobility {{RC-clergy-stub